Demand is unusually high for Ohio's relatively healthy pumpkin harvest this year

Thursday

Sep 29, 2011 at 12:01 AMSep 29, 2011 at 10:39 AM

Ohio's crop of pumpkins for jack-o'-lanterns and decorations is expected to be good or at least average this year. But demand from the Northeast, where pumpkin crops were damaged by Hurricane Irene, could push prices higher.

Tracy Turner, The Columbus Dispatch

Ohio’s crop of pumpkins for jack-o’-lanterns and decorations is expected to be good or at least average this year. But demand from the Northeast, where pumpkin crops were damaged by Hurricane Irene, could push prices higher.

Central Ohio’s weather didn’t do the local pumpkin crop any favors.

Record rains in the spring and an unusually hot and dry summer led the state’s pumpkin crop to an “erratic performance,” said Lisa Schacht, board president of the Ohio Produce Growers and Marketers Association.

While local weather problems merely delayed planting and harvest for some, entire crops were destroyed in the Northeast by flooding caused by the hurricane last month.

Wholesale prices have doubled in some northeastern states as farmers there nurse their surviving pumpkin plants toward a late harvest.

Some farmers are trying to buy pumpkins from other regions to cover orders. Many are looking to Ohio, which last year harvested 6,900 acres of pumpkins, yielding a crop worth $16.7?million, said Joe Cornely, spokesman for the Ohio Farm Bureau.

The state accounted for 10.4?percent of total U.S. pumpkin production last year, he said.

“While Irene didn’t impact our pumpkin crops, there could be some impact on our market,” Cornely said, based on the principle of supply and demand.

But pumpkin farmers were having a difficult year even before the storm. Heavy rains this spring meant many farms had to postpone planting for two or three weeks, setting back the fall harvest, said Jim Murray, owner of the Applejacks Orchard in Peru, N.Y.

A late harvest can be fatal to business because pumpkin sales plummet after Oct.?31. Wholesalers need to get pumpkins on their way to stores by mid-September.

Already, buyers have been coming in from other states to Ohio farm auctions to buy pumpkins for markets in the Northeast, said Jim Jasinski, a fruit specialist with the Ohio State University Extension.

Weather also has been a hindrance for some Ohio growers, who were delayed a couple of weeks with their planting, said Schacht, who also runs the Schacht Farm Market in Canal Winchester.

While she has harvested much of her pumpkin crop, there are numerous growers statewide who are still waiting for their crops to mature, Schacht said.

“There are a lot of green pumpkins still in the fields,” she said. “And some areas are getting too much rain now, which is causing diseases that may affect the quality of some of the fruit and may prohibit harvest.

“But other areas are missing some of that excess moisture and are harvesting an abundant supply of high-quality product.”

That means that despite the weather delays and the increase in demand for Ohio and Michigan pumpkins, consumers statewide shouldn’t have any trouble finding pumpkins in stock locally, Schacht said.

“There will be growers that harvest and sell to more channels than they normally have in recent years, because there is a stronger demand for what fruit is out there,” she said. “But (Ohio) consumers aren’t going to have a hard time finding an ample supply of good-quality pumpkins for sale.

“And they’re not going to have to break the bank to buy it.”

In fact, the pumpkins are plentiful at Jacquemin Farms in Plain City, said Kerry Sullivan, whose family has run the 47-acre spread for 24?years. She said despite a shorter growing season that has reduced the size of some of the pumpkins, the farm has a nice supply of pie and carving pumpkins.

“Last year was crazy dry and this year was crazy wet, but we do have plenty of pumpkins overall and our crop is good,” Sullivan said. “Last year, they were in the 40- to 50-pound range, but this year, in the 30- to 40-pound range.

“And they’re still very nice to look at.”

Information from the Associated Press was included in this story.

tturner@dispatch.com

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